Hanging out with Cassidy

The big girls have been at summer camp this week (afternoons only) and it's been mostly me and Cassidy just hanging out at home. She is one happy little baby.

I started to tidy up her room and pack away all the 0-6 months clothes. I actually had a lump in my throat knowing that I will never use those clothes again. Oh well, trade off is I'll get to sleep and I should (with a little work) get my body back.

We stopped using the Miracle Blanket a couple months ago. I found it in her room and I've had to pack it away. This is the best picture I could get of her in it. She is so wiggly! She's always trying to roll and move now.

We will also have to pack away the swing soon too. She is trying to get out of that when it's moving and grabbing at the legs. In this picture Olivia was just cracking Cassidy up! She would say "peek" to her and Cassidy would laugh so loud!

Random stuff

Cassidy has found her toes! I was in the kitchen making dinner when I heard a sucking sound...

Sisters....aww isn't that sweet? Who knew that seconds later there would be a brawl. Just kidding! Kinda....

Miss Independent....she likes to feed herself. I hope she's independent like Miss Alexis. But not too independent because I want her to stay my baby for a long time.

Lexie took this picture of me.

Busy day

Today was free admission day at PNE so we headed off early to get our free parking as well. Paying $20 for parking is just ridiculous and thankfully we found free parking around Notre Dame high school. We're trying to wean Olivia off the stroller so we just brought the green stroller. This was Cassidy's first time in the back of the double stroller and she was amazed! It was a totally new view for her. (As you can see from the photo we still haven't totally weaned Olivia from the stroller) The first place we went to was "Those little donuts". Yum! It was 9:30am but that didn't stop us from eating up those yummy little donuts! After walking around for a bit we headed over to the Super Dogs. I love those dogs!!! They are so entertaining. I stayed for most of the show but Cassidy was getting tired so I left a little early and put her in my Moby wrap. I just have to say again that I LOVE MY MOBY WRAP!! Having Cassidy all cuddled up close to me is such a delicious feeling. She's so quiet and calm when she's in the wrap on me. She ended up falling asleep and having a nice little nap while we walked around the PNE. After the Super Dogs show we went to the barn and checked out the farm animals. Dan and I were laughing at ourselves b/c as we walked around the barn we kept saying things like "Don't touch that! It's got germs." We bring our 3 year old and our 5 year old into a barn full of farm animals and ask them not to touch! So after we saw the farm animals we kinda felt done but we still had to have lunch. What's the PNE without having a nice meal of extremely over priced, yummy smelling but mediocre tasting food? Dan got a gyro and I got some butter chicken while the girls each got a corn dog. After eating we tried to head home. It was slow going b/c there were TONS of people coming in. And Olivia's shoe was bugging her so we had to keep stopping to fix it. As we get to the entrance gate it gets crazy. There are a lot of people leaving but some are getting re-entry stamps which is causing a huge bottleneck. Then the people who are coming to the fair are starting to RUN towards us b/c the free admission is close to ending. The PNE staff begin to make a chain to stop the people from coming in. It was very interesting. The walk back to the car wasn't too bad but I did have to carry Olivia. We were all exhausted when we got home. Lexie had a nap but the other two girls didn't. I so wish I could have a nap.

Later at home Cassidy was on her play mat. She's been getting up on her knees a bit lately but today she was trying so hard to crawl! She's getting around a bit but not on purpose. She's actually moving backwards. See the picture with Lexie? Cassidy started out in the middle of the jungle gym (on her back) and ended up with her feet in the t.v. stand eventually. I can't believe that she is starting to become mobile!!! My how time flies. I'm sad to think I'll never go through a pregnancy or baby phase again but also excited to think about what the future holds. Like a little more sleep maybe???

Look who's eating cereal!

It's not the kind of cereal we all remember from our childhood. The special kind of sugary cereal that we got on weekend mornings. No, it's powdered rice cereal mixed with breastmilk. Yum right? I've been teasing Olivia and Lexie if they don't sit and eat their breakfast I'll take their food away and they'll end up with a bowl of it too. Neither Lexie or Olivia liked it when they were little but all the books and "experts" say to start with rice cereal. It's easiest on little tummies and non-allergenic. Cassidy isn't even swallowing it yet. She still has the tongue thrust reflex and everything comes out onto her chin and bib. (Seriously, I wouldn't swallow it either) Next week I'll try oatmeal and maybe she'll tolerate that enough to swallow. After oatmeal she'll be at that magical 6 months and we'll go on to something yummy like apples or pears.

Who's who at 5.5 months old?

Check out these three pictures. They're all of the girls at 5 months old. Can you guess who's who?
(oh my god, am I the luckiest mom ever? Those are 3 gorgeous babies!!!! so says the humble mom...)

Cassidy's update: She's reaching and grabbing for everything. At first it would take me by surprise b/c I wasn't used to it. Like when I was bringing back muffins to the breakfast table and she reached out and grabbed the muffin. She was bringing it to her mouth as I grabbed it away. She can now roll from her tummy to her back. We brought out the jolly jumper and she's loving that. When she's on her tummy, she's bringing her knees up and moving forward a bit. She's also able to move her upper body around too. She'll be playing with one toy then notice another off to her right and she'll swing her body over to get that toy. She's still not sleeping through the night. Ugh. She was getting up twice a night the last few nights. I think she was going through a growth spurt. Last night she went back to sleeping from 7pm-3:30, then up at 6am for good. These days getting up at 7am is considered "sleeping in" at our house. Her napping has gotten considerably better. She's actually napping!!! It's not consistent but it's a heck of alot better than before. She'll usually do about 30mins in the morning and then maybe an hour in the afternoon. She also has to have a little sleep in the stroller, carseat or mommy's arms inbetween the two naps. I start to nurse her around 5:30 and I've been putting her down- awake- at 7pm. Putting her down awake is a huge improvement. Before I would have to hold her in my arms until she was in a deep sleep. If she woke up (or one of the noises coming from her big sisters rooms woke her up) I would have to "restart the clock" and hold her longer. I have to say that Cassidy is truly a happy baby. She is so sweet, smiley & is constantly cracking up. She finds humour in alot of things. When I look at her my heart is full of love. I thank God for her everyday. She wasn't planned but truly a gift from God.

Answer to above photos:

far right (wearing brown pj's) is Lexie; middle (wearing pink & green sleeper and eating the spoon) is Cassidy and the far left (wearing the bib) is Olivia

New hairdo's!

We trekked all the way out to Surrey with the girls so that Dan, Olivia & Lexie could get their hair cut. Lexie's hair is so short to begin with but we wanted it cleaned up a little and Rola (the hairdresser) swears that a haircut will make her hair grow. Every once in a while Olivia will make a comment about Lexie's hair looking like a boys but luckily those comments don't seem to bother Lexie. (They bother me though!) I'm always complimenting Lexie's hair and telling her how beautiful it is. As you can guess, I'm always telling the girls how beautiful and cute they are. (I do try to compliment more than their looks too so that they know beauty is on the inside too) I feel so strongly that one of my jobs as a mom is to make my girls feel like they are the most beautiful girls in the world and their looks are perfect. There is so much pressure surrounding girls and their appearance. I hope that if my girls are always told they're beautiful they'll always believe it. So far it's working. Lexie was looking at her new hair and said "It's beautiful".

The girls wouldn't wash their hair at the salon so the new 'do's aren't quite as nice looking as they could be. Remember when Olivia cut her's and Lexie's hair? Well, the bangs are finally fixed up from that fiasco.

My Sweet Olivia

Olivia has always been my most challenging child.

If I had 6 more children she would still be the most challenging. While she can be sweet, funny, insighful, smart and so freaking cute, she is also very demanding and very high strung. Me and Dan with a high strung child??? How did that happen? But I've been working so hard to carve out some alone time with me and Olivia. I think she's been extra tricky since Cassidy was born. I asked her if she felt a little jealous that I had another baby and she said "What??!! No, I love her." Oh my, my heart melted. So anyway, I wanted to get out while Cassidy napped yesterday so I grabbed some summer dresses for the girls and told them they were coming on a Mommy-Livy-Lexie adventure. Lexie was watching Toy Story (for the 200th time) so she didn't want to come. I did manage to convince Olivia to come out with me. So yesterday we went to a toy store on Cambie called EIO. She had so much fun in there! And she didn't even ask me to buy anything. That was a nice surprise for me.

We ended up buying these cute little bags called Itzy Ritzy Snack Happened bags. I'm trying so hard to live life with less waste. I'm always packing ziploc bags so I thought I would try these instead. (Olivia picked out the cat theme for her and Lexie)

Then we headed over to a clothing store for mommy but I found nothing that looked good on me. Blah....that's a whole other post.

Tomorrow Olivia, Lexie and Dan are getting their hair cut. We're gearing up for kindergarten!!! Olivia is so excited. I asked if she missed preschool and she said "No, I want to go to kindergarten!" I'll post pictures of before and after.

Oregon 2010 Part Four: Oregon Zoo

Let me just start off this post by saying that the night before we went to the zoo I got up at 3:30 to feed Cassidy. And I never went back to sleep!!! Little stinker wasn't liking her playpen or maybe it was the air conditioning but she wasn't sleeping more than a few hours in her playpen so I was bringing her into bed with me. We brought a portable bedrail (holy cow we had alot!) so she slept next to the rail and me. So it meant that I didn't sleep well when she was next to me. And she was always right next to me or practically on me!

On our last full day in Portland we went to the zoo. The last couple of years we've had a great time walking through the zoo with the girls and just enjoying everything. I was looking forward to it and thought it would be relaxing. Cassidy had other plans. She should have fallen asleep in the car on the way to the zoo. Or she should have fallen asleep in her stroller while we were walking around but she didn't do either of those. After some freaking out crying, I put her in my moby wrap and she calmed right down. The big girls had a blast checking out all the animals. They even went through a Dinosaur exhibit and didn't get traumatized. Well, not too badly. They didn't want to get close enough to the dinosaurs for any pictures.

As I'm sitting here typing this post I'm melting. No, I wish I could be melting my unwanted pounds away but I'm seriously sweating. I can't think so I'll just post lots of pictures of our day at the zoo.

Oregon 2010 Part Three: OMSI

***OMSI stands for Oregon Museum of Science & Industry.*** Since we're Science World members, we can go to OMSI for free. We went last year and had a blast so we decided to go again this year. Getting there was quite the gong show though. There was a bicycle ride through Portland that shut the bridges down. We should have followed the signs but they sounded so confusing, having us go north when we wanted to go south. We did finally make it there and it was well worth the trouble getting there. Their section for young kids is called Science Playground and we spent most of the time there. Olivia had a time out in the van so I got to go ahead with Lexie and Cassidy first. I'm not sure what Olivia did but it probably involved whining and crying and of course not listening to us. Right in the middle of the Science Playground is a sandbox. It's really fun and actually not that messy. After the girls went there it was over to the water part. Lined up on a wall are different size crocs for the kids to wear and aprons to keep them partially dry. I say partially b/c the girls had so much fun splashing around they did get a bit wet. While we were in the water park Dan left to go to the Nike outlet not too far away. I don't keep a clean house or cook fabulous meals but I do let my hubby go shopping while I watch the three girls. After they were done playing in the water we went into the Discovery Lab where they played quite a long time with the flubber. In there they also got to paint a picture using a spinner thing. I'm sure there's a better name for it but I have no clue what it is. The paper spins around while you drop different colors onto it. When Dan came back from Nike we were still in the Science Playground. It was at about this time that Cassidy started fussing and I knew she needed to sleep. She would almost fall asleep but there were so many sounds at this place that she kept waking up. I took her out for a walk along the river but that didn't work. We had to get her back into the car so she would fall asleep. So it was back to the hotel where the girls got to go swimming with daddy and Cassidy had a nap. (and by nap I mean she slept in my tired, tired arms!)

Oregon 2010 Part Two: Tigard & Washington Square Mall

So as you may know Dan and I love Oregon. It wasn't always that way with me. Back in 2008 when Lexie was about 1 and Olivia was 3 I said to Dan "Let's go to Hawaii this summer!" Dan's response was "Let's go to Oregon!" Um, no. I don't want to go to Oregon, I want Hawaii. Dan said there was an aquarium somewhere there and Olivia would love it. Hello, Hawaii has an even better aquarium and it's called the ocean. Well, I wasn't back to work yet and Hawaii was expensive so I started to research Oregon. We had a blast that first trip and couldn't wait to come back the next year. The first place we stopped in on that trip was Tigard. Tigard is a suburb just south of Portland. I found it by googling Pottery Barn Kids and then using google maps to find the nearest hotel. Love google maps!!! Turns out the nearest hotel is an Embassy Suites. The hotel room is an actual suite with the bedroom seperated from the living area. The room is huge! To give you an idea of how huge picture this: in the bedroom we've got a playpen, a stroller, 2 suitcases and a nightstand. Yes, that's right OUR own nightstand. On our way from Seaside we drove by a Costco and at that costco there were about 3 different nightstands that match Lexie's furniture. Our van is so honkin huge we are able to buy that nightstand and bring it back home- with room to spare. So we've got all that stuff just in the bedroom and there's still tons of room to move around. Anyways, back to the trip. We got to the hotel early and we were able to check in about an hour and a half early. All of us were super excited to get over to the mall next door. It's got so much that we love: Pottery Barn Kids, Gymboree, Build a Bear, Lego, Disney Store, awesome play area, and a Cheesecake Factory. If you've never been to a Cheesecake Factory and you're in the States YOU MUST GO!!! The menu is like a book. There are pages and pages to choose from. The food is delicious and the portions are huge. Olivia was just asking today if we could go there. But the awesome thing about is that we can take our food to go! That was really handy, especially considering I start nursing Cassidy to sleep around 5:30. So I would get Cassidy down to sleep by 7:30 and Dan would have the big girls in bed by the time I would come out of the bedroom. Olivia and Lexie slept on the pull out couch in the living room. It would take them a while to get to sleep but they were usually asleep by 8pm. Dan would go out to do some shopping from about 7:30-9pm and I would hang out sneaking around the dark room. That room got so dark too! It would be super sunny outside but in our room it was like the middle of the night. The girls slept in a little bit the second part of our trip. Breakfast was in the atrium and was so yummy. There was omelettes, bacon, sausages (or hot dogs as Lexie calls them!), pancakes or french toast, fruit, yogurt, muffins, cereals and juices. And we only paid $103 a night for our huge room and yummy breakfast!

The first full day we were in Tigard we went to the outlet mall about 30 minutes south called Woodburn Company Stores. Dan and I just love it there but the girls weren't too excited to be there. They were happy the first hour or so when they played in a little tree house but after that they were bored. I went to the Gymboree outlet first and was so excited when I found a 15% off coupon. I have an obsession with buying stuff ahead of time. Each girl has rubbermaid buckets of stuff I've picked up on sale. I HATE buying stuff at regular price. Even Olivia and Lexie know that we only buy stuff on sale. The gymbo outlet had their watermelon line on sale and I snatched up tons of it. I get people all the time telling me that they can't afford Gymboree. Ya, I can't either if I were to pay the regular price. It's all about knowing the ins and outs of sales and being on their email list. Never buy stuff from the front of the store unless it's part of a special sale. Most of what we bought was for the girls but we did manage to get a couple things for ourselves. Coach had an extra 20% coupon so I finally got a Coach purse. We didn't get to shop nearly as much as we would have liked but that's life with 3 little ones. It seemed to be the theme of the outlets: bored, crying, whining children with not enough to do. It actually made me feel better to see other parents struggling to control their kids. (I know, not nice of me!!) Dan and I have dreams of one day visiting Woodburn by ourselves. That's right, no kids. As soon as I stop breastfeeding...

***We were so busy that we forgot to take pictures of us at the Embassy Suites. Here are more pics of us at the beach. ***

Stay tuned for more about our trip to OMSI (Portland's Science World) and the zoo.

Oregon 2010 Part One: Seaside

Dan and I did it: we took a road trip with our 3 girls ages 5, 3, and 5 months. And we survived!!!! And so did they.

Our goal was to leave on Tuesday at 6:30am. We actually beat our goal and we left our house around 6:15. Off we headed to Seaside, Oregon. According to google maps it's about 5.5 hours to get there from our house. But factor in pee breaks and breastfeeding stops and it took us 9 hours! It was a nice 9 hours though. Cassidy was pretty calm, as she usually is and Olivia and Lexie only fought a little bit. They had a dvd player to keep them occupied for a good chunk of time. So we stayed at the same hotel as last year- the Rivertides Suites. It has all the things Dan and I look for in a family friendly hotel: seperate bedroom (for naps), breakfast included, walking distance to good things for the girls and a good price of course. Before we left Dan made a comment about how we should think about staying in a 2 bedroom suite this time. Hmmm.....I thought about it and thought about and thought about it some more. I have lots of time to think about things as I breastfeed Cassidy many hours a day. So at the last minute we changed our reservation from a 1 bedroom to a 2 bedroom condo. So glad we did because you should have seen all the stuff we brought with us!!! We had Cassidy's play pen, the double stroller, the single stroller (Cassidy sleeps so well in the single stroller but it's so handy to have our double stroller for the big girls), the exersaucer (have you seen how honkin huge this thing is??? but Cassidy loves it and it gives our arms a break), the bumbo, both my carriers, 2 suitcases full of clothes, 2 empty suitcases for all our loot we're bringing back, 2 Dora suitcases full of stuff to keep the girls busy, and lots of food.

Our days in Seaside were pretty much all the same: girls up early, breakfast down in the lobby, take Cassidy for a walk for her morning nap, girls go to the beach with Dan, take out lunch, hang out in hotel, swim in pool, take out for dinner and then bedtime. All 3 girls were asleep by 8pm each night which was nice. Dan and I would hang out in the living room and just chill. I got some wine from Costco on the way down and really enjoyed that quiet time. But let me tell you about how early Cassidy was up: 5:18, 5:37 & 4:35! Brutal. She would wake up quite happy, just quietly chatting. Coincidentally, Lexie was up early a couple of those days too. We would try so hard to get the girls back to sleep but it just didn't happen.

The weather wasn't the greatest but still mild. The girls were still able to enjoy the beach. It was cloudy in the mornings with some sun in the afternoon. The town was pretty quiet in the mornings but livened up the afternoons. I especially enjoyed my walks with Cassidy early in the mornings. It was just us and the people walking their dogs. We just love Seaside and had about as relaxing time as you can with 3 kids five and under.

7 years ago....

On August 2, 2003 I started a new life. I married the most fabulous, handsome, sexy guy. So here we are 7 years later and the parents of 3 gorgeous little girls. (so says the modest mom!) We've never really been able to have much of a celebration of our anniversary because I've either been pregnant or nursing a little one. The first year we had a free room and meal from the Four Seasons. I had such terrible morning sickness but I was determined to make the most of it. I remember I had soup and I didn't throw it up so that was nice. The next few anniversaries have been a blur. Lexie was born on July 31st so since 2007 it's been hard to carve out a little time for us. Today we went to Provence while all 3 girls stayed with Dan's mom. (First time I left Cassidy!) Luckily Olivia and Lexie keep themselves so busy and Cassidy is a pretty easy baby. (well, when we're not talking about sleep she's fairly easy!)

Happy Anniversary Dan! Love ya babe! Next year we're going all out.